`Titanic' star lives it up - in N.Y. eatery

Leonardo DiCaprio cavorted on the streets of downtown Manhattan, ate sushi and went nightclubbing with three pals while the "Titanic" swept the Oscars on Monday night.

The Oscar-snubbed box-office boy wonder blended in with other New Yorkers as he waited on line for more than 30 minutes to get into a sushi restaurant in SoHo - just as all of Hollywood settled into Los Angeles' Shrine Auditorium for the awards.Wearing a light blue knit cap, baggy jeans and layers over a thermal shirt, the 23-year-old screen star got antsy and began to playfully kick-box with his male friends on the sidewalk while waiting for a table at the popular sushi joint, witnesses said.

Despite the shiner he sported under his left eye, DiCaprio was recognized by an employee of nearby Liam's, who invited him to the restaurant's Oscar bash.

But the star politely passed on the offer.

DiCaprio's friends - two guys and a thin petite blond beauty, who was not attached to the star - finally were let into the sushi eatery just as the awards show was beginning.

The actor took a seat facing the wall and made up for lost time by ordering "tons and tons of sushi," according to one witness.

The group lingered for a couple of hours and then made its way to hang out at the lounge at Moomba restaurant about midnight, witnesses there said.

"He didn't seem at all concerned about the Oscars," said one New Yorker who sat near the star Monday night. "In fact, I heard him say to his friends, `I want to go to India. Come on! Let's get on a plane and go tonight!' "

- WOUNDED SURGEON: The knives are out for Steven M. Hoefflin, the celebrity plastic surgeon who's being investigated on charges of molesting his patients. Hoefflin's former partner, James Hurvitz, and Hugh Hefner's former girlfriend Carrie Leigh just sued Hoefflin for defamation in L.A. Superior Court.

The suit charges that Hoefflin labeled former patient Leigh "just an Internet pornographer like her ex-boyfriend Hugh Hefner." Hoeff-lin also allegedly claimed Leigh "was not credible because she was a lesbian and was sexually promiscuous."

Hurvitz charges that Hoefflin alleged that he "abused drugs, was dishonest and that he was incompetent as a doctor."